As a celebration of the M1's 30th anniversary, BMW unveiled a low-slung sports car concept called the M1 Hommage back in 2008. It was shown off at the Concorso d'Eleganza at Villa d'Este, and at the time was purely a design exercise. No powertrain specs were released, and the car didn't even have an interior. Little did people know, this was actually the beginning of a long line of work on the eventual BMW i8 supercar that will debut in 2015.

It's similarities to the 2009 Vision EfficientDynamics Concept and the i8 Spyder Concept are pretty obvious. Although the kidney bean grilles aren't as small, the front fascias line swoop to the center (kind of reminds us of Gladiator's/MFDoom's mask), the laser headlights on the i8 are nearly identically shaped, the air scoops that pump cooling into the rear brakes are still there, and the rear panels slide under the hatch. They knew what they were doing all along.